Calling
by Thundere
Summary: Xander got possessed by the hyena spirit when he was 5, and was killed. 10 years later, due to the Slayer's arrival in Sunnydale, Xander is resurrected. And that's where the fun (bloodshed) begins... Ratings for safety.
1. Prologue

**Calling**

**~Prologue~  
**_Written by: Thundere_

**Disclaimer**: This is fanfiction, I own no content_ nor _do I make any profit of it.

.

_April 14, 1987, Sunnydale California_

This Tuesday was more or less like any other Tuesday that preceded it.  
The Harris' family woke up, shared their breakfast while making plans for the holiday.  
If they had known just what would have happened mere hours away at the zoo, they most likely would've never set foot outside of their house.  
But alas, they were no psychics, just the average middle-class family like many others in Sunnydale, so they didn't know, and so they went.  
Henry Harris and his wife Jessica shared a cup of coffee at the diner near the exit of the zoo, while their five year old son Alexander watched the zebras with amusement.  
All of a sudden, Alexander, or Xander as some referred him as, felt a gust of chilly wind, which in a way was odd,

since the leaves and branches of the nearby tree didn't move in the slightest.  
Xander felt numbness warp him as his legs began to move on their own accord, as if he was a puppet on strings.  
Xander began to panic when he noticed that he couldn't call for help. Not that he didn't try, the words just seemed to get stuck in his throat.  
Tears began to ascend his cheeks as he was lead to what looked like an abandoned warehouse with a "Keep Out" sign on the door, which could only mean trouble.

Something seemed to guide his hand to the door handle, and he stumbled into the murky room.  
A low growl was heard, and Xander helplessly raised his gaze and glanced at the cage a few meters away.  
Green eyes observed him intently, and he felt dread oozing up.  
He was alone, helpless,_defenseless_. Then, _it_ attacked. Whatever it was, left him hurt and defeated.

Xander struggled against the invading entity, but felt how the world turned darker and darker.

He fell into a bundle on the floor, and then he knew no more.

.  
It wasn't until another hour the body of Xander Harris was discovered near the cage of sleeping hyenas.  
His mother screamed, and searched comfort in her husband's arms.  
Paramedics were called, but by the time of their arrival to the scene, it was already too late.

Alexander Harris was already dead.


	2. Chapter I - Welcome to the Hellmouth

**Calling**

**~Chapter I~**  
_Written by: Thundere_

**Disclaimer**: This is fanfiction, I own no content _nor _do I make any profit of it.

.

_'In every generation, there is a chosen one._  
_She alone must fight against the vampires, demons and the forces of darkness._  
_She is the slayer' - Giles_

_._

_Sunnydale, 1997_

Buffy Summers, the current Chosen One, had put it all behind her. Or so she thought.  
She and her mother Joyce Summers had just moved from Los Angeles to Sunnydale, in hopes of starting a new life freed of monsters,

demons, destinies and everything between.  
With a first glance at her new school "Sunnydale High", Buffy had no reason to believe that, aside from her slightly tainted school records,

she would be any different from her fellow school girls.  
Just one visit to the library would change all that.

.

"So, you're the new girl, huh," a brown haired boy with gentle eyes asked. Buffy nodded. "I'm Buffy. And you are?"

" Oh! I'm sorry, I'm Jesse," Jesse smiled sweetly and pointed to a redheaded girl sitting in a corner with a considerable mount of books in her lap.

"That's Willow, a friend of mine. Care to meet her? She's really nice, I promise." Buffy looked over to the girl. She certainly seemed harmless enough.

"Yeah, sure. I'd like that." As it turns out, Willow was as sweet as she seemed to be, once you got over her knack of constant babbling.

"We're heading to Bronze tonight, you want to come," Jesse asked. Buffy sent Willow a questioning glance. "The Bronze, it-it's a really cool place.

It's where all the high school kids hang out." Jesse smirked. "It's the _only_ place people in our age group can hang, s'ppose that's why it's considered cool, huh?"

Jesse laughed to his own inside joke and added, "Also, the death-rate is seemingly lower there."

If there was one line worth raising an eyebrow to, Jesse's last sentence certainly was. "Death-rate," Buffy inquired flatly.

"Well, yeah. I suppose I shouldn't be telling you this, what, with you being here new and all," Jesse said. "But you know that about 15 percent of the school's students never graduates."

"Why, they flunk out," Buffy asked, while an ominous feeling wrapped her stomach. Jesse's eyes flashed darkly. "No, they turn up dead, or simply listed as missing, never to be heard of again."

.

In retrospect, Buffy's talk with Jesse that morning, morbid as it was, was nowhere near as creepy as her first acquaintance with the school's new librarian Mr Giles.

.

_Jesse's house, 5:16 PM_

Jesse gasped loudly as a new series of blows and kicks rained down upon his laying frame. Fresh blood caked a few tips of his hair, and he raised his arms in an attempt to shield his face.

His drunken father left him there, bloodied and crying on the bathroom floor.

He was so sick of this. He was so sick of his father's abusive ways, his mother's ignorance and his neighbors blindness. Most of all, he was sick of his own weaknesses.

He slowly pushed himself up, cradled his knees, and wept. The hopelessness of his never-ending pain and daily torture was overwhelming. He had to get out.

With a glance towards the bathroom door, he quickly got onto his feet and left the room, ran down the flight of stairs and left his cursed home behind.

Jesse ran and ran. He didn't stop running until he was at least 5 blocks away from his house. Then, he stopped to catch a breath.

He straightened his back and turned when he heard a noise behind him. Jesse stared at the woman. "Feeling lonely, precious? I'll make it all go away," she purred.

Jesse gulped, and another tear found it's way down his cheek. The woman suddenly embraced him. "I'll make the pain go away, never to touch you again."

He didn't see her face change.

.

_Outside of Bronze's street corner, 8:30 PM_

One fast hit with the stake, and the vampire was gone. Only a pile of dust remained as proof that the man had ever existed.

Buffy sighed and turned to leave the site, when suddenly she was kicked backwards.

She fell flat on her back, landing hard on the ground and raised her gaze towards the figure standing over her.

It was Jesse. "Fancy meeting you here, Buff," Jesse sneered. Buffy got back onto her feet, studying Jesse's frame. Something seemed very _off_ about him since this morning. "Jesse?"

Jesse hummed sweetly with a predatory gleam in his eyes. "Jesse... yeah, that's what I was called," he replied as his face changed form.

Buffy stared at her school friend and now turned vampire. "... when I was still alive!"

Jesse cackled madly while observing how tears began to brim Buffy's eyes. "I'm so sorry I couldn't save you," she whispered softly.

Abruptly, Jesse stopped laughing and regarded her with an annoyed look in his crazed eyes. "No need to apologize to me, slayer," he said, almost regrettably.

"That way I won't regret this!" His fist hit Buffy head on. Jesse smiled, his sweet smile turned vicious as he gazed upon his former friend.

"I'm stronger now," he said with a contended purr. "No longer bound by the rules and social repressions and insecurities forced upon us

by all those condescending "know-it-all's" and screw up's of adults that doesn't know jack and doesn't care."

.

_Meanwhile at the Sunnydale cemetery_  
2 meters into the cemetery, 4th row, 3rd tombstone to the right just below a big oak tree, was where the body of a 5 year old rested.  
Fog illuminated the name and date from ten years prior.  
_'Alexander Harris_  
_1982-1987'_

The earth was heavy and soft due to the fog, very easy for something to crawl out of, if one were inclined to such cravings.

Which, in this case, something - or rather _someone_ - certainly was. A dirty arm sprung out of the mud.

Another soon followed the first one, and pushed the mud out of the way as a head of an adolescent male slowly raised.

The man heaved himself up out of the much too small child grave he'd rested in, and took a shallow gasp of air; his first one in a decade.

Xander was finally back. He didn't know why it was, and didn't know how, but then again he didn't care much for it.

It was all in the past, and all that mattered to him presently was his rumbling stomach.

His dark brown eyes flashed a faint hue of green, and his nose picked up a sweet scent of blood and strawberries.

Two seconds later, he'd left the cemetery, and his grave, never to return.


	3. Chapter II - Prey

**Calling**

**~Chapter II~**  
_Written by: Thundere_

**Disclaimer**: This is fanfiction, I own no content _nor_ do I make any profit of it.

AN #1: Leave reviews, tell your thoughts about the story, so I'll know what I'm doing right/wrong.

.

Unsurprisingly, it came natural to him. Hiding in the shadows, lurking, waiting.  
Just in that very _moment_ when all of his senses screamed '**Prey!** **Hunt! Fight! Feed!**'  
Standing alone in the dark alley, safely concealed by shadows, he watched as the blonde girl fought against a creature he'd never seen or even heard of before.  
She was hurt. Even from the long distance, he could easily pick up the scent of blood she was shamelessly shedding, a clear invitation to the nastiest of the nasty,

and doing so seemingly without a care in the world.

The girl was either dumb as a post, or simply suicidal. Whatever option it may be, the creature overwhelmed her.  
It wouldn't be long until_ His Ugliness_ got the upper hand and decided to end her suffering.

It seemed wrong, somehow, that the monster -whatever it was- got to feed on _his_ prey.

This was **his** district, everything that moved around in this neighborhood naturally belonged to him.  
It was only due to that fact that Xander opened his mouth to speak.

.

"Hey!" Buffy, as well as the vamp that tried to eat her, stilled as a light voice as though of a child, spoke.  
"Yes, Your Ugliness, I mean you," Xander said, as his vocal cords tried to adjust to his much older form than that of the child he'd been a mere hour ago.  
He coughed slightly, and continued his speech with the voice of a teenager's.

"Did you just call me _ugly_," Jesse interrupted, slightly stressing the word 'ugly' in the process. Sure, he was dead, but that was just offensive!  
Xander snorted. The creature wasn't only butt ugly, he was vain as well. "Well, what else am I supposed to call you - _corogi_?"

Jesse growled, starting to feel pissed at the stranger. "Who are you?" Xander growled back, showing his teeth. "Name's Xander. Who the hell are you?"

"Um.. guys? In middle of something 'ere," Buffy stated while pointing her stake in a dangerous manner. Xander and Jesse stared at her, and exchanged glances with each other.

Was that chick for real? Apparently so, as she took a swing with the stick in Jesse's direction. Jesse parried her blow, and landed one of his own.

Buffy fell onto the ground, which Jesse took as his due to leave. One last glance in Xander's direction, and Jesse was swallowed by the shadows of the night.

Xander stared at the direction where the creature had vanished into, and then turned his gaze towards the girl on the ground.

He sighed in defeat, and then reached out a hand for the girl to take.

Buffy stared at the hand that was reached out to her, looked up to the stranger calling himself "Xander", and then begrudgingly accepted the hand helping her to stand.

"Thanks for helping me with the vampire, Mr Hero," Buffy said, and turned to walk away from the site, leaving Xander to stare at her back.

He easily caught the undertone of sarcasm in her comment, but still the notion baffled him. _Helping_ her? Why would he?

His only intention by stopping the creature from eating the girl in the first place wasn't out of some sort of heroism, it was because _he_ wanted to eat her.

"Women," he murmured to himself, as he walked out in the night. "Never worth the trouble they cause."

.

A lone figure stepped out of the shadows, observing Xander's retreating figure.

'Interesting. A newbie slayer, and a visitor of the past. Wonder how this will turn out,' he thought to himself, and turned to walk away in the other direction.

.

Xander wandered around aimlessly, as he pondered over the things he'd learned tonight. "So, vampires do exists, and they can change forms," he said to himself.  
Hmm, that could prove to be useful to know. But who was that blonde girl with the stick? She didn't seemed fazed by the whole "Vampires are real" thing, as one would expect.

Well, one thing's for sure, she certainly smelled delicious. Speaking of delicious, his nose picked up a new scent.

"Well, my stomach's not getting full this way," he stated plainly, and then ran off in the same direction the scent was coming from.

The scent came from an elderly man, walking slowly with a walking stick. How he'd managed to get that far without ending up as someone's snack, Xander didn't know.

On the other hand, he didn't care either. All he cared about was that the man started to look all the more tempting. Like a walking meatloaf.

'Yeah, I could go with that', Xander thought, and crunched down on all fours, waiting for the man to come closer.

'No, not yet,' he thought while he listened to the sound of footsteps coming closer. 'Not yet, not yet...'

The man passed him by, whistling on a merry tune Xander didn't recognize. The man suddenly tripped, and fell hard on the sidewalk. '**_Now_!**'

The man, whoever he'd been, never stood a chance.

.

_Next morning_

Buffy marched into the school's library, in search for the creepy guy (aka Giles).

"All right, so what's the sitch?" Giles furrowed his eyebrows. 'Sitch? What in the world is that?'

"I beg your pardon?" Buffy threw her arms out, frustrated by the librarian's obvious lack of knowledge in the Buffy-language.

"I mean, what's the deal? I told you yesterday that I wanted no part in this slaying business anymore, and still the Fangy Friends doesn't seem to get the memo."

Giles stared at her. "You're the slayer. Period. What were you expecting them to do - become anorectic just because _you_ decide to ignore your duties?"

Indeed, it was a good question. One that Buffy hadn't thought to ask herself. Giles had raised a fair point, Buffy knew that, but it did little to keep her emotions in check.

"I'm sixteen years old, Giles. I'm supposed to worry about my grades, whether I'll pass this class or if I'll make any friends." At this point, she wanted to cry.

But as usual, no tears would come. They never did. Never for her.

"I'm not supposed to worry about the fact that I'm constantly standing at Death's doors," she whispered silently.

For the first time since he'd met her, Giles felt compassion for this child doomed to a lifetime of constant battle tug at his heart strings.

.

The building did little to impress him. He certainly felt boredom rise just by looking at all the white walls of stone.

'I've been at cemeteries livelier than this,' he thought to himself.

Nevertheless, it was here the escaped prey had vanished into. "Welcome to Sunnydale High," Xander recited the board.

His eyes flickered green and smirked. "Huh, 'Sunnydale Hell' is more like it."

.

.

AN #2: Point 1, this is NOT a bashing fiction. The only reason Giles was snarky/quickwitted, is because I like him that way.

Point 2, "Visitor of the past" is a reference to the movie Vampire Hunter D.

Point 3, "Corogi" is the Japanese word for "cricket".

Point 4, In the tv-series, Buffy had been a slayer for a year prior to her arrival in Sunnydale. In this fiction, it isn't so.

She's been the slayer for approximately 4 months, and thus, a tad lacking in the training department.

She's not weaker in this story than she was in the tv-series. She just appears that way. And once again, this is not a Buffy-bashing story.

I've run out of points, so I can't tell you anything more without risking of spoiling the next chapter, so I'll keep my mouth shut.

_Until next time then/ Thundere_


	4. Chapter III - Too good to eat

**Calling**

**~Chapter III~**  
_Written by: Thundere_

**Disclaimer**: This is fanfiction, I own no content _nor_ do I make any profit of it.

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After his not so successful murder attempt of the slayer, Jesse had returned to the lair where his sire and master waited for him.  
He felt a chill run up his spine as his master looked at him with a profound displeasure.  
"I gave you power," she said slowly, her voice in a low tone. "I gave you life," she continued, her cruel smirk faltered.  
"I gave you everything you could have possibly dreamed of, and this is how you chose to repay me?"  
Jesse lowered his head, her words had indeed hit as close to home as it possibly could.  
If he'd still been alive, he probably would've cried. Only favor of being dead, is that pain isn't considered to be a bad thing. It more or less become a second nature.  
"You fancy me as a fool? Well? Do you?!" The frayed ends of the whip she held in her hand cracked, dangerously close to his face.  
"I did not create you to play the bloody jester, I made you to devour the slayer!"  
By this time, she had worked up enough of her fury to physically express her malevolence. Strangely enough, Jesse didn't mind.

Jesse closed his eyes as the whip once again cracked in the air and hit him in his face.

He slowly opened his eyes, staying silent while William, his sire, thew the toy away into a corner.

His sire left the room, and not until then, he let his unshed tears flow freely.

.

A week had passed since Buffy and Giles came to an understanding after their initial animosity.  
Whether it was for good or worse that Buffy had reclaimed her position as the slayer, she could not say.  
However, with Jesse running around in town creating havoc wherever he went, Buffy knew she had to keep up her training

and what better way was there than spending quality time with her appointed watcher?  
Besides, after the first three awkward meetings, being around Giles didn't seem like such a bad thing.  
Furthermore, it did indeed feel good to have a friend to confide in.  
Willow had so far been a good friend to her, but she didn't know anything about the hellmouth, or what Buffy really was,

which made her friendship with Giles even more appealing.  
That he was also somewhat good looking didn't hurt either, Buffy silently thought to herself.

"Listen up, class, we have a newcomer today," the dull voice of teacher Mr Petersen broke Buffy's not-so-pure thoughts of her new watcher.  
"All right, you can come in now," Petersen continued, directed to the new student, whoever it may be.  
In walked, lo and behold, none other than the mysterious guy Buffy had met the week before.

'What is he doing here,' Buffy thought to herself. 'Is he stalking me now?'  
Cordelia, the queen of the school, discreetly observed the new student closely.  
He was, in lack of better words, stunningly handsome with his dark hair with orange highlights.  
Xander swept one quick glance at the rest of the class, and then turned his attention to Mr Petersen.

"Well, go on then," Mr Petersen told Xander. "Don't you want to say something to your classmates?"

Xander snorted silently. As if the humans held any interest with him. If it wasn't for the blonde chick, he wouldn't even be here.

"Can't say I do," Xander answered with a glance at the teacher, while a few students snickered. Apparently, it didn't take much to amuse people in this town.

In retrospect, it also didn't take much to get on the school staff's bad side, either.

.

Meanwhile, in the abandoned warehouse, a blonde female vampire twisted her body in a trace-like manner.  
"Jesse, darlin'," William called out for her youngest childe's attention. "Yes, Sire?"  
Jesse greeted the blonde older vampire respectfully.  
"How do you feel about to play a game with the itsy-bitsy slayer?"  
In response, Jesse smirked, his eyes flashed darkly.  
Crazed laughter escaped his mouth, while his lovely Sire's womanly frame shifted.

.

Just a few hours after sunset, one could find the slayer and her watcher patrolling the streets of Sunnydale.  
It had started off as a good night, three vampire's had already bit the dust, and another creature of the night had been disposed of.  
In the meantime, Buffy had taken it upon herself to get to know her watcher a bit better.  
"Uh-huh, what happened with the pixie afterwards," she asked Giles with a badly concealed curiosity.  
Her watcher had just told her about a few of his exploits in Paris, something she found, in lack of the evil undead to punch, extremely fascinating.  
"W-well," Giles stuttered sweetly. If he'd been a decade younger or Buffy a few years older, she'd totally hit that.  
"Naturally, my friend and I couldn't leave it to create even more havoc for the citizens, so we..."  
The rest of Giles story went untold as another member of the Fanged Friends made his presence known.

"Why ever would you not? Havoc can be pretty fun, I'd say". Buffy turned a hard stare towards the vampire. "You again," she stated with distaste.  
Jesse smiled sweetly for a second, then remembered that he was supposed to fight, and his smile vanished altogether.  
"Well," he said slowly in a sing-song register. "You didn't honestly believe you'd seen the last of me, had you?"  
He jumped off the roof and landed hard on the ground, breaking his ankle in the fall. Chuckling, he raised to stand while his ankle repaired itself.  
He didn't get much chance to see the blow coming his way, until it had already graced his face. Buffy twisted her body, her legs hitting the target in a chain-reaction.

While Buffy regained her position, Jessie swooped down on Giles.  
Granted, his orders didn't include the glasses-wearing fossil, but it didn't mean that he couldn't play with the watcher.  
Unfortunately, he hadn't the time to inflict more than a few measly flesh wounds before the slayer had once again hit him.  
He growled, his facial expression radiating pure dissatisfaction.

"A stake would be nice," Buffy wheezed out as she landed another blow. Jesse flew back into a heap on the ground.  
"Maybe if you'd just once remembered to get your weapons back after you've dusted your opponents, you wouldn't require my assistance, miss Summers," Giles, the Watcher - and cleverly disguised as the school librarian - exclaimed with a sigh, meanwhile secretly wondering how he could be so (un)lucky to be appointed to a slayer as scatterbrained as Buffy was.

It truly was a mystery how the current slayer had managed to live as long as she had. From all intents and purposes, she should be dead.  
But evidently she wasn't, and now he was stuck with this... this, inexperienced _child_.

'I wonder if I offended someone in a previous life to deserve that,' he thought, as Buffy was kicked back by the cackling vampire. Jesse smiled, baring his fangs.

In no time he'd reached the slayer and taken a strong grip on her throat, lifting her off the ground as if she'd been featherweight.

His yellow eyes locked with her gold brown as he drew her closer, his white teeth glistening of saliva.  
"This is is, slayer," he purred with satisfaction. "This is the end of the line, how the fate of all slayers turn out to be."

Buffy tried to fight it, tried to get out of the choking hold the vampire with the face of her friend kept her in.  
Giles woke up out of his daze only to be greeted by a sight all watchers fear the most. His slayer was about to be killed, by a fanged monster.  
Swallowing his fear, his resolve to keep the current slayer, his charge and responsibility, alive was once again awoken.

Giles got back onto his feet, ignored the pain and blood from his wounds, and gripped a stake.  
Buffy may have a hard time slaying her former friends gone bad, Giles however had no such reservation. He'd seen too much, lived far too long to let that get to him.  
Just as he'd raised the stake in remembrance of the saying 'it's do or die', Jesse's face shifted back to his human facade, a panicked expression in his wide eyes.

In the next moment he was gone, dust in the wind. Buffy fell onto her knees, violently coughing.  
The lack of oxygen had taken it's toll on her as she felt the world return in full colors.  
Giles crunched down beside her, letting a hand softly squeeze her shoulder in an attempt of comfort.

"So, anyone feel up to cluing me in on what this whole slayer-business is all about," a voice asked coyly.  
The slayer and watcher respectively took in the newcomer. It was Xander, the new mysterious student no one seemed to know anything about.  
Buffy and Giles exchanged a glance. 'What do we do now,' Buffy silently asked her watcher.

While the duo was preoccupied in their silent conversation, Xander studied the two closely.

"You know, for humans you come off as slightly interesting," he stated plainly. Buffy turned her gaze towards Xander, while Giles felt a shiver run down his spine.

He didn't know who this stranger was, but his mind and body was telling him the same thing; whoever the kid was, he wasn't someone to play with.

"And who might you be pray tell," Giles asked Xander, while currently preoccupied with deciding whether he posed as a threat or not.  
Buffy nudged his shoulder while whispering that he was the new student at their school.  
Xander laughed, "Yeah, evidently I am, but that's not what you should be asking yourself, old man."  
He smiled sweetly at the duo, while his eyes once again changed colors.  
Reflexively, Buffy got into a defensive position in front of her watcher, with a gnawling feeling in her gut telling her that this could, and probably would, turn out ugly.

Xander stood passively at his spot for a few seconds, and then he lunged forward. Buffy kicked back the oncoming opponent, sending him flying into the brick wall.  
He fell down onto his knees, raised his gaze to meet Buffy's eyes and then slowly got back onto his feet.

Needless to say, he enjoyed dancing with the slayer, very much so in fact.  
In their dance of Death, she seemed to become even more fiery and just like the firefly drawn to the fire, she let the fire consume her completely.  
It all served to arouse, and a fine job it did indeed. Just in time for his intended final punch to extinguish the flame, she delivered one of her own.  
Blood was spilled, flowing freely from both sides and mashing together in an almost abominable symbiosis.

Standing in dead-end, the warriors of flame and death respectively was engulfed in a staring contest, one wishing to burn all opposing her,

the other wishing for nothing more than to consume all that was her. Xander let his tongue taste the blood dripping of his chin.

After a few seconds, he sighed and glanced at Buffy's figure. It was just like he'd suspected, 'though deep down, he'd hoped to be proven wrong.

"Well, it seems like your in luck, slayer," Xander told her with a playful smile hiding in the corner of his mouth.  
"Oh, yeah? Why's that," Buffy asked, one eyebrow raised in an inquiring manner.  
Xander grinned pleasantly, and leaned in closer, as though he was confiding in her. "You're simply _too_ good to eat."

.

.

_AN: **Point 1**, the name of Jesse's Sire has now been revealed. If you thought it would be Darla, I'm sorry. __(Actually I had planned it to be Dru, but I changed my mind)_

_I don't care much for her character (Darla's, that is), so I decided to keep her out of the story for the time being._  
_However, that doesn't necessarily mean that you won't be seeing her in the future._  
_**Point 2**, Angelus is not the only vampire with a curse in this story, although it's of a different kind._  
_**Point 3**, this story is AR, for some parts to the extreme, and I very much intend to keep it that way._  
_That would be all. Ja ne! See you in chapter 4._  
_/ Thundere_


End file.
